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On The Edge - Launch Day!

Rolf is one of my edgiest heroes yet. He's an alpine champion and also the tycoon owner of a sporting goods conglomerate. He's very focused and single-minded--selfish and rude, even. Definitely on the icy side.

Glory is a romance author with a lot of insecurities and guilt that keep her from standing up for herself. At first. Then she melts this hard-hearted man into a puddle.

For various reasons, Glory is in the closet about her aspirations as a writer, but she's drawn to Rolf, even though she pretty much can't stand him.

They wind up in a show down, which you can read below.

Rolf does have a conscience buried beneath that rhino hide of his and it starts to prickle after this scene.

Setup: Glory doesn’t want to help her father renovate Blue
Spruce Lodge. She wants to write romance. She’s doing it on the sly, using Rolf
as inspiration for her hero. Rolf is a gold-medal, alpine champion, a tycoon
who a world-renowned sporting goods conglomerate, and the owner of Whiskey Jack
Resort, which he is bringing back to life as a training facility for elite
athletes. He’s the full, romance-hero package right down to the chartered
helicopter.

He’s also a bit of a dick. Glory is determined to be
nice to him, however. It’s kind of her job, working for her father in the
lodge. But she’s having a bad day when Rolf asks her to make him a coffee. He’s
aware that she’s been watching him a little too closely. He thinks she’s coming
on to him and decides to make some things clear:

~ * ~

Rolf looked into the top of
his mug. The foam heart made his own shrink and harden.

These flirty touches of
hers, accompanied by hopeful smiles and eagerness to please, were piling up and
setting off alarm bells. He was the full package. He knew that. She was hardly
the first woman to eye up his looks, standing, and fortune, then make a play
for a piece of it. He had an ex-wife who had
taken a piece.

Maybe he owned a little
responsibility for the way she was leaning in. He had cast one or two glances
that she might have construed as interest. That was his dick doing his thinking
and he needed to yank a halt on that as much as her. It was time to make clear
that coffee art, and pillow chocolates, and inspiring quotes on the bottom of
emails, didn’t affect him.

Drawing a breath, he went
straight to the heart—pun intended—of the matter.

“I don’t know what you think
might happen between us, but it won’t.”

She jolted like she’d caught
a spark of static electricity. Her hand paused where she was writing something
on a clipboard and she lifted her strawberry-blonde lashes, taken aback.

“I beg your pardon?” Her
voice was so thin he barely heard it.

He bit back a sigh and
licked his lips. “You seem to be making an effort to catch my attention.” He
nodded at the foam heart. “I just want to be up front, so there aren’t any
misunderstandings. I’m not interested.”

Maybe that was harsh, but he
wasn’t someone who danced around, avoiding the hard jobs.

Her eyes widened even more,
growing wounded and embarrassed. Pink bled into her face so deep, her freckles
disappeared. Her bottom lip started to quiver before she bit down on it. Her
brow pleated and her eyes began to gloss.

He set his back teeth, not
having planned to make explanations, but maybe he needed to dial this back a
notch. “We work together—”

“No, we don’t! You treat me
like I work for you.”

He cocked a brow at that.
Well, yeah. He was paying for a room and all.

“I’m trying to be nice.” Temper was gathering around her
like storm clouds, making her voice grow loud and strident. “Not that you would
know what that looks like. You think I’m coming on to you? You can’t even
change your own toilet roll! You don’t get Valentines for that, you asshat.
Making hearts with foam is so basic, it means I’m not even trying. But if you
don’t like the way I’ve made your coffee, fine.”

She grabbed his mug and
threw it into the bar sink where it bounced out and clattered to the floor,
sending coffee exploding all over the walls, counter, and floor.

Adrenaline shot through him
in reaction to the violence, sending a jolt of aggression into him that pushed
him onto his toes, determined to grab control of a situation that was in full
tailspin.

“Get a grip. This is a work
environment.”

“This—” her hand flung above
her head to indicate the lodge “—is a prison sentence. In Siberia. One where
Herr Rolf rules. Do you know I’m supposed to be in Paris with my mom? Instead, I’m stuck here with a
prick who goes out of his way to make me feel shitty about myself. Not
interested? Fuck you, Rolf. Fuck you and your brother’s dog, too.”

She spat the words. Her
whole body shook and her eyes showed white around fiery green centers.

“Are you done?” he bit out,
dousing her tantrum with the unmoved ice in his veins.

“So done.”

“Great. Can I get coffee?”

“Help yourself.” Except she
didn’t say ‘help.’ It sounded a lot more like ‘Gofuckyourself.’

She walked out, and he heard
Devon say, “You tell him, girl.”

“Oh, now you want to act
like we’re friends? Screw you, Devon.”

“Hey!” Devon said, but
Glory’s footsteps clomped away.

Rolf became aware of the
fact that music had been turned down in the kitchen. Everyone in the vicinity
had gone quiet to listen.

Fan-fucking-tastic.

He walked around the bar, dropped
a towel on the spill, rinsed his cup, and helped himself to a regular coffee
from the brew of the day. He walked back to his office through the kitchen,
telling the kid in the dish pit to clean up behind the bar. Safety first.

Then he closed the door to
his office with a firm hand and sat down to work, telling himself he had
accomplished what he meant to. Maybe it hadn’t been elegant, but it was done.
All was right with his world.

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